Islam OnlineStrongly Islamist, generally supports the government of Sudan. Know the other side..

Al-Ahram WeeklyFrom the editor: "providing as honest and objective a look at contemporary Egyptian and Arab reality as possible -- as seen through Egyptian and Arab eyes."

Sudan - News and Analysis by Eric ReevesBy far the best independent analysis of the developing situation--and usually much more pessimistic than official accounts. Also usually proves to be more accurate.

The Passion of the Present (the essay)

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In Darfur, a region in western Sudan approximately the size of Texas, over a million people are threatened with torture and death at the hands of marauding militia and a complicit government. Genocide evokes not only the moral, but also, the legal responsibility of the world community. Under international agreement, a nation must intervene to stop a genocide when it is officially acknowledged.

"Officially" is the key word here. So far, no nation in the international community has "officially" acknowledged the truth: Sudan is a bleeding ground of genocide. In this void, the Sudanese government continues to act with brutal impunity.

Thankfully, there are individuals working
in human rights organizations who are watching - and witnessing - and organizing, in support of the victims in Darfur. These individuals represent,
for all of us, a personal capacity to bear witness to the passion
of the present; one candle lit against the darkness.

However, before one can light a candle,
someone has to strike a match:
a donation to any of the human rights organizations active in Sudan, contacting your government representative, local newspaper, radio and t.v. station. Our individual activism is essential for the candlepower of witness to overcome and extinguish the firepower of genocide.

This world has long endured wars that take lives. Let us be part of one that saves them.

About: The Passion of the Present site is a totally non-profit labor of love and hope - in peace. Thanks for joining the effort.

About this blog

Our name comes from an essay entitled "The Passion of the Present" that one of our grassroots founders wrote and circulated by email in March of 2004. The blog started at the Berkman Center at Harvard Law School.

The editors are semi-anonymous in order to keep the focus on Sudan. This site is a resource for a blog-based information community now numbering several hundred interlinked bloggers and sites. Visitors come from around the world. Daily traffic ranges from just under a thousand visitors, to more than eight thousand on days when news attention peaks.

Our technology cost for a public blog service, with no special discount, is still just $13.46 per month! Start a blog if you don't have one already!

March 31, 2005

The United States allowed the U.N. Security Council on Thursday to refer war crimes suspects in Sudan's Darfur region to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, a tribunal it opposes.

The Bush administration abstained in a vote on a resolution after receiving concessions that would bar prosecution of Americans participating in U.N. operations in Sudan. The vote was 11-0 with four abstentions.

In a major reversal for the Bush Administration, the United States agreed Thursday not to oppose a U.N. Security Council resolution that authorizes prosecuting Sudanese war crimes suspects before the International Criminal Court, diplomats said.

The U.S. government compromised after getting ironclad guarantees in the resolution that Americans who are part of any U.N. peacekeeping operation in Sudan would not be handed over to the court for trial if any accusation was made against them.

The diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, said at least four countries would abstain: the United States, Brazil, China, Algeria and possibly Russia.

Even with the concessions, the U.S. decision not to veto was a landmark shift. Ever since he took office, President Bush had actively opposed the court, and American diplomats had repeatedly said they opposed any variation that referred the Sudan cases to it.

But in the end, the pressure against the Americans was too great. France, Britain and seven other Security Council members have ratified the ICC statute, while two more have signed and are expected to ratify.

The document is the last of three Security Council resolutions aimed at putting pressure on Sudan to stop a crisis in Darfur, where the number of dead from a conflict between government-backed militias and rebels in Darfur is now estimated at 180,000.

The United States itself has declared genocide has occurred in Darfur and demanded swift action. A veto could have also been politically damaging exactly because of those American demands, and the impression that a veto would have made it look like the United States was stalling.

The Bush administration had wanted an African court to try those accused of war crimes, but the U.S. proposal had little support among the 14 other Security Council nations.

The U.S. decision to allow the court to prosecute war crimes perpetrators could raise hackles among conservatives for whom the court is an unaccountable body that cannot be trusted.

They include John Bolton, the undersecreta ry of state for arms control and international security and President Bush's nominee to become the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

In the course of an interview last week, the US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice described the tragic events in Sudan's Darfur region as "really just a horrible situation". A few days ago, the House of Commons international development committee underlined just how horrible, with its estimate of 300,000 deaths since the conflict broke out and its description of the world's response to Sudan's humanitarian crisis as "a scandal". That was business as usual for the international community in its approach to Darfur's horrors: hand-wringing and outrage in various measures, and what seems like a combination of impotence and inquietude. Yet the greater surprise is that at the same time there have been signs of the international community moving to tackle Sudan's nightmare, after many months of inaction.

First, the United Nations' security council approved the deployment of 10,000 troops to the south of the country, to monitor the peace deal there that ended a 20-year civil war. That may not directly help the black farmers and families in Darfur, under attack from Janjaweed militia tacitly backed by the government. But by supplying more troops it provides ballast to stabilise the country, increases the UN's involvement and gives help to the Africa Union's small force trying to keep the peace in Darfur.

Second, the UN also voted for sanctions against the perpetrators of violence in Darfur, where brutal killing and a deadly brand of ethnic cleansing has been carried out since February 2003. Darfur has become the site of what many - including Colin Powell, when he was the US secretary of state - described as genocide. The security council resolutions allows travel bans and asset freezes to be levelled at those who commit atrocities or break ceasefire conditions. At the same time, the central government in Khartoum is barred from conducting military flights in the region, or from sending arms to the area without the UN's permission.

Third, and most extraordinary of all, was the news yesterday evening that the US was to drop its objections to a resolution allowing the leaders of the violent counter-insurgency to be brought before the International Criminal Court. If true, that would represent a mile-wide change of heart by the Bush administration, which has previously resisted anything that it saw as lending legitimacy to the ICC. Although the court has received widespread international support, it has become a bete noire among US politicians on the right, afraid that its soldiers or civil servants overseas could be exposed to malicious lawsuits. Yet the ICC was created precisely to deal with events such as Darfur, and a US security council veto of referrals to the court would turn America's attempts to halt the violence into hollow words.

The US's action is a welcome surprise given its sponsorship of the two earlier resolutions, and shows a commitment to multilateralism in a week when the UN has been battered by attacks on its leadership. Meanwhile, it was China and Russia that shamefully abstained on the vote to impose sanctions on leaders of the killing gangs. China, an eager customer of Sudan's oil output, appears to have blocked an oil embargo, which would have bought unequivocal economic pressure on Khartoum.

The destruction and killing visited on Darfur might best be understood as ethnic cleansing along the lines seen in Kosovo, rather than the spasm of violence that gripped Rwanda. That means stopping the killing and the flight of an estimated 2 million people from the region will be messy and time-consuming. The best solution remains an African one: more support for the African Union, and encouragement for it to send larger peacekeeping forces. The sooner that is done, the better for Darfur.

The United States was expected to allow the U.N. Security Council on Thursday to refer war crimes suspects in Sudan's Darfur region to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, diplomats said.

They said the United States would abstain, rather than use its veto power to kill the resolution that would ask the ICC to investigate those responsible for pillage, rape and slaughter in Darfur.

British Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry told reporters he was confident the measure, drawn up by France, would be adopted by the 15-member council. And a French official told reporters: "There is a deal. There will not be a U.S. veto."

The Bush administration, which fiercely opposes the court, sought to write blanket exemptions from prosecution for American citizens into the resolution.

The final wording has to be approved by council members, nine of whom have ratified the treaty creating the ICC, set up to prosecute individuals for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

France said it expects the U.N. Security Council to vote Thursday on a resolution that would authorize the prosecution of Sudanese war crimes suspects by the International Criminal Court, and U.S. officials said Washington had dropped its objections to using the court in this conflict.

But France and the United States were struggling over the language in the resolution, with Washington demanding ironclad guarantees that Americans working in Sudan would not be handed over to the court and still holding out the possibility of a veto if it doesn't get them.

The meeting was repeatedly delayed, first until 5 p.m. [Eastern], then to 6 p.m. and later to 9 p.m. as the two sides discussed language.

``U.S. officials have given a plethora of ideas to the French that would guarantee that Americans wouldn't be vulnerable to prosecution by the ICC and are awaiting their reply,'' a U.S. official said, using the initials of the court.

France and the eight other council nations that are parties to the ICC met Thursday to discuss the proposed U.S. amendments, council diplomats said.

The Bush administration wanted an African court to try those accused of war crimes, but the U.S. proposal had little support among the 14 other Security Council nations.

The United States wants the perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan's western Darfur region brought to justice, but it opposes the International Criminal Court on grounds that Americans could face politically motivated or frivolous prosecutions.

The U.S. decision to allow the court to prosecute war crimes perpetrators could raise hackles among conservatives for whom the court is an unaccountable body that cannot be trusted.

They include John Bolton, the undersecretary of state for arms control and international security and the Bush Administration's nominee to become the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

The 97 countries that have ratified the 1998 Rome Treaty establishing the court - including all European Union nations - maintain that there are sufficient safeguards built into the process to prevent unwarranted prosecutions.

France agreed to postpone a vote until Thursday after the United States said it wanted to amend the draft resolution to ensure that no Americans could be handed over to the court, the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal, U.N. diplomats said.

The 15 Security Council nations have been deadlocked for weeks on the issue of holding people accountable in Sudan, and the court's supporters have demanded a vote on the French resolution.

The French draft introduced last week would refer Darfur cases since July 1, 2002, to the International Criminal Court. That was the recommendation of a U.N. panel that had found crimes against humanity - but not genocide - occurred in the vast western region.

In a clear concession to the United States, the resolution said citizens of countries that have not ratified the treaty establishing the court will not be subject to prosecution there if they take part in activities in Sudan.

Negotiations on the resolution's final draft have been going on in key capitals, with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier, and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw trying to agree on wording that would allow the United States to abstain rather than veto the resolution, the diplomats said.

A text circulated later Thursday made substantive changes, but does not include the strong language the United States seeks that would ensure peacekeepers and civilians sent to assist the Sudan effort could only be tried by their own national courts if they are accused of a crime.

A veto could be politically damaging because it could give the appearance that the United States opposed the punishment of those responsible for atrocities in Darfur, where the number of dead from a conflict between government-backed militias and rebels is now estimated at 180,000. The United States itself has declared genocide has occurred in Darfur and demanded swift action.

France said it expects the U.N. Security Council to vote Thursday on a resolution that would authorize the prosecution of Sudanese war crimes suspects by the International Criminal Court, and U.S. officials said Washington had dropped its objections to using the court in this conflict.

But France and the United States were struggling over the language in the resolution, with Washington demanding ironclad guarantees that Americans working in Sudan would not be handed over to the court and still holding out the possibility of a veto if it doesn't get them.

The Security Council scheduled a meeting on Sudan at 5 p.m. [Eastern] Thursday.

``U.S. officials have given a plethora of ideas to the French that would guarantee that Americans wouldn't be vulnerable to prosecution by the ICC and are awaiting their reply,'' a U.S. official said, using the initials of the court.

France and the eight other council nations that are parties to the ICC met Thursday to discuss the proposed U.S. amendments, council diplomats said.

The Bush administration wanted an African court to try those accused of war crimes, but the U.S. proposal had little support among the 14 other Security Council nations.

The United States wants the perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan's western Darfur region brought to justice, but it vehemently opposes the International Criminal Court on grounds that Americans could face politically motivated or frivolous prosecutions.

The U.S. decision to allow the court to prosecute war crimes perpetrators could raise hackles among conservatives for whom the court is an unaccountable body that cannot be trusted. The 97 countries that have ratified the 1998 Rome Treaty establishing the court - including all European Union nations - maintain that there are sufficient safeguards built into the process to prevent unwarranted prosecutions.

France agreed to postpone a vote until Thursday after the United States said it wanted to amend the draft resolution to ensure that no Americans could be handed over to the court, the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal, U.N. diplomats said.

The 15 Security Council nations have been deadlocked for weeks on the issue of holding people accountable in Sudan, and the court's supporters have demanded a vote on the French resolution.

The French draft introduced last week would refer Darfur cases since July 1, 2002, to the International Criminal Court. That was the recommendation of a U.N. panel that had found crimes against humanity - but not genocide - occurred in the vast western region.

In a clear concession to the United States, the resolution said citizens of countries that have not ratified the treaty establishing the court will not be subject to prosecution there if they take part in activities in Sudan.

Negotiations on the resolution's final draft have been going on in key capitals, with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier, and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw trying to agree on wording that would allow the United States to abstain rather than veto the resolution, the diplomats said.

Details of the final text were not disclosed in Washington or New York.

A veto could be politically damaging because it could give the appearance that the United States opposed the punishment of those responsible for atrocities in Darfur, where the number of dead from a conflict between government-backed militias and rebels is now estimated at 180,000. The United States itself has declared genocide has occurred in Darfur and demanded swift action.

On Tuesday, the Security Council passed a resolution strengthening the arms embargo in Darfur to include the Sudanese government and imposing an asset freeze and travel ban on those who defy peace efforts.

Last week, the council voted to deploy 10,000 U.N. peacekeepers to monitor a peace deal between the government and southern rebels that ended a 21-year civil war. The council hopes the resolution will also help Darfur move toward peace as well.

MPS, human rights organisations and survivors from the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan today called for greater international action to prevent further bloodshed.

More than 100 MPs and peers from all parties have signed a parliamentary statement calling for the United Nations to authorise peace-enforcement operations to be led by African Union (AU) troops with financial and logistical support to come from wealthy countries.

The Protect Darfur campaign was being launched at the House of Commons.

Campaign co-ordinator the Aegis Trust - an organisation which seeks to prevent genocide - released comments by politicians from various parties calling for action.

Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy said: "Strong and concerted peace-enforcement action in Darfur is now essential, with full UN backing."

A member of the international development committee, the Conservative MP John Bercow, said today: "Too many people in Darfur have suffered too much for too long with too little done about it.

"The international community must now act through the UN by imposing sanctions on the Sudanese government, extending the arms embargo and providing the African Union force with the troops and mandate necessary to enforce peace in the region."

Later today in New York the UN security council was expected to vote on a resolution put forward by France that would authorise the prosecution of Sudanese war crimes suspects by the international criminal court (ICC).

After weeks of vexed negotiations, approval now seems virtually certain after US officials said Washington had dropped its objections. France had delayed the vote in hopes of averting a US veto.

Th Bush administration had preferred that an African court try alleged perpetrators of war crimes, but the US proposal garnered little support among the 14 other security council nations. The US opposes the ICC on the grounds that Americans could face politically motivated or frivolous prosecutions.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed and more than 2 million people uprooted by the fighting in Darfur, which began in February 2003.

The violence stems from a campaign led by government-supported Arab militias against African rebels. Last September, the former US secretary of state Colin Powell said the perpetrators had engaged in genocide.

Tens of thousands of displaced people are confined to refugee camps, refusing to return to their villages for fear they would only be forced to flee once again.

Earlier this week, the UN security council passed a resolution strengthening the arms embargo in Darfur to include the Sudanese government and imposing an asset freeze and travel ban on people who defy peace efforts.

Last week, the council voted to deploy 10,000 UN peacekeepers to monitor a peace deal between the government and southern rebels that ended a 21-year civil war. The council hopes the resolution will help Darfur move toward peace as well.

Commentators have drawn parallels between what is happening now in Darfur and the killings of some 800,000 people in Rwanda in the early 1990s, when the international community failed to intervene to stop the genocide.

"There's all this talk of UN resolutions, but there's a failure to act, to give a big enough force powers to stop the killing," said Labour MP Clare Short.

"The UK should immediately be calling for a UN mandate under chapter seven (of the UN charter, allowing UN-approved military intervention without the consent of a state) so that the African Union force can be much longer, much larger," Short, a former development minister, said.

"We're focussing on that, not because the other things don't need doing, but let's do that first, and urgently."

The Protect Darfur campaign launch came as the Security Council in New York prepared for a controversial vote on whether to refer war crimes in the vast western Sudanese region to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

The council on Tuesday authorised sanctions, in the form of travel bans and asset seizures, against individuals who commit atrocities or undermine peace efforts in Darfur.

A parliamentary committee also advanced a new death toll this week for Darfur, saying more than 300,000 people had died in the region's 22-month conflict, begun when a local rebellion launched in February 2003 was put down by the Khartoum government with the help of Arab militias.

The militias and troops are accused of gross human rights violations, including widespread killing and rape in an ethnic cleansing campaign that has displaced more than 2.4 million people.

In this context, Conservative MP John Bercow said, the UN debate about sanctions against and ICC prosecution of the authors of the atrocities was "breathtakingly secondary to the enforcement of peace".

Bercow, a member of the international development committee which released the new death toll, dismissed the UN sanctions as powerless to convince Khartoum to rein in the atrocities.

"Does anybody really think the government of Sudan... is to be dissuaded from that massive premeditated military exercise by the thought that some members of the regime will be subject to a travel ban?" he said.

"Does anyone seriously think that they're going to be quaking in their boots at the thought of an asset ban?"

TODAY COULD MARK A TURNING POINT in U.N. Security Council action against the butchering in the Darfur region of Sudan. Or it could mark still more world indifference to the slaughter.

The Security Council is set to vote today on France's resolution to authorize the International Criminal Court to prosecute war crimes in Darfur.

But once again the United States seems ready to thwart this sensible move. The Bush administration has objected to ICC intervention - in fact, to its very existence - on the grounds that the court could be used to prosecute the United States military or its citizens. President George W. Bush has little ground to stand on in resisting an ICC role in Sudan. Nearly 100 nations have signed the Rome Treaty establishing the ICC.

Instead of calling in the ICC, the administration is urging that sanctions be imposed on Sudan. Never mind that the sanctions option has proved futile. Former U.N. Ambassador John C. Danforth made headway in ending a civil war between the government and rebels in the south of the country. But he had no success in convincing the Security Council to impose tough sanctions against Sudan for the violence in the Darfur region in northwest Sudan. China, a chief importer of oil from Sudan, is certain to continue to stand in the way of sanctions. So will Russia, which exports weapons to Sudan.

Sudan, meanwhile, is stalling. On Monday, its justice minister announced that the government had just begun arresting military and security officials accused of slaughtering civilians, raping women and burning villages in Darfur. This announcement was timed mainly to stave off tough Security Council action today.

The ICC is tailor-made for situations like those in Darfur. It already is in operation in The Hague and has jurisdiction over genocide and war crimes committed after July 1, 2002.

Mr. Bush needs to put this crisis in perspective. Some 180,000 people have been slaughtered and another 2 million have fled ahead of raids by the Janjaweed militias, which have wiped out non-Arab villages. American and U.N. indifference to these destabilizing events would not bode well for peace and security in Africa.

AS WITH its February report on UN mismanagement of the Iraq oil-for-food program, this week's report of the Independent Inquiry Committee on the employment of Kofi Annan's son Kojo by Cotecna, the Swiss firm hired to monitor that deeply flawed program, just barely leaves the UN secretary general untainted by corruption.

Those who have been clamoring for Annan's resignation may be disappointed that the committee, headed by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, found ''no evidence that the selection of Cotecna in 1998 was subject to any affirmative or improper influence of the secretary general in the bidding or selection process." But the real scandal of Annan's career has little to do with Iraq or with his tolerance of high UN functionaries who exploited their position for personal gain. The real reason Annan does not belong in a post that should inspire trust in people around the world is that he has an indefensible record of placing his institutional loyalties before the value of human lives in Rwanda, Bosnia, and now Darfur.

Annan is a man of great charm and intelligence. But in 1994, when he was in charge of UN peacekeeping, he refused to heed faxes from Lieutenant General Romeo Dallaire, the commander of the UN forces in Rwanda, reporting Hutu extremist plans to massacre the Tutsis of Rwanda. In January of that horrible year, Annan prevented Dallaire from capturing a large arms cache that would be used three months later to slaughter 800,000 innocent human beings. And when the slaughter began, Annan cabled Dallaire: ''You should make every effort not to compromise your impartiality or to act beyond your mandate but may exercise your discretion to do so should this be essential for the evacuation of foreign nationals."

The United Nations, founded to prevent a recurrence of the Nazi horrors, should not be impartial between the victims and the perpetrators of genocide. As depicted in the heart-wrenching film ''Hotel Rwanda," the mandate of Annan's peacekeeping department to rescue only ''foreign nationals" was a betrayal of the imperiled Rwandans, of the UN's larger purpose, and of basic human solidarity.

A decade later, Annan offered a careerist's apology, saying, ''I believed at that time that I was doing my best." His best was not good enough to save 800,000 lives in Rwanda or the 7,000 Bosnian Muslims who were massacred in the UN ''safe" zone of Srebrenica in 1995, or the 10,000 Africans who are perishing each month in Darfur while Annan declines to use his authority to demand a forceful humanitarian intervention. Annan should resign not because he failed to keep his son from embarrassing him but because he has allowed the United Nations to appear useless in preventing crimes against humanity.

The United States is dropping its objections to use of the U.N.'s International Criminal Court to try Sudanese responsible for an ethnic cleansing campaign in the Darfur region that has killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted more than 2 million, administration officials said Wednesday night.

The administration had preferred that an African court try the case but agreed to a compromise during daylong discussions at the United Nations on Wednesday.

The United States has strongly opposed the ICC on grounds that American service members or civilians serving overseas could be subject to politically motivated or frivolous prosecutions.

In return for its concession, the United States received assurances that Americans deployed in Sudan, in whatever capacity, would not be subject to ICC prosecutions, the officials told The Associated Press. They asked not to be identified because the decision has not been officially announced.

The decision could raise hackles among conservatives for whom the ICC is an unaccountable body that cannot be trusted to the right thing. The 97 countries that have ratified the 1998 Rome Treaty establishing the court maintain that there are sufficient safeguards built into the process to prevent unwarranted prosecutions.

The administration agreed to a compromise after concluding that opposition to the U.S. stand was too strong, particularly among Europeans, who have been united in support of the ICC, which is based in The Hague, Netherlands, as the trial venue.

Concerned about a possible U.S. veto, France on Wednesday delayed a U.N. Security Council vote on a resolution to authorize an ICC prosecution.

The western Sudanese region of Darfur has been the scene of perhaps the world's worst humanitarian crisis. The widespread death and destruction has been the result of a brutal counterinsurgency campaign led by government-support Arab militias against black African farmers. The conflict began in February 2003.

Last September, former Secretary of State Colin Powell said the perpetrators had engaged in genocide. Tens of thousands of displaced Darfurians are confined to refugee camps, refusing to return to their villages for fear they would only be forced to flee once again.

The United States, as one possible option, has suggested that ``a hybrid court'' be impaneled by the United Nations and the African Union to try the Darfur perpetrators. It has said the ICC is already overextended, with existing commitments in Congo, Rwanda, Central African Republic and Ivory Coast.

But critics have said the ICC is ready to take on the Darfur prosecution, arguing that the tribunal proposed by the United States would take a year to get off the ground.

France said it expects the U.N. Security Council to vote Thursday on a resolution that would authorize the prosecution of Sudanese war crimes suspects by the International Criminal Court - with approval virtually certain after U.S. officials said Washington had dropped its objections.

France delayed Wednesday's vote in hopes of averting a U.S. veto - and the additional time appears to have won over the Americans.

Administration officials in Washington said Wednesday night that the United States was dropping its objections to using the court after concluding that opposition to the U.S. stand was too strong, particularly among Europeans.

France's U.N. Mission said Wednesday night it expects the council to vote on the resolution on Thursday, probably in the afternoon.

President George W. Bush's administration had preferred that an African court try alleged perpetrators of war crimes, but the U.S. proposal garnered little support among the 14 other Security Council nations.

The United States faced a dilemma because it wants the perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan's western Darfur region brought to justice but it vehemently opposes the International Criminal Court on grounds that Americans could face politically motivated or frivolous prosecutions. An ethnic cleansing campaign in Darfur has killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted more than 2 million.

In return for its concession, the United States received assurances that Americans deployed in Sudan, in whatever capacity, would not be subject to ICC prosecutions, the officials told The Associated Press. They asked not to be identified because the decision has not been officially announced.

The U.S. decision to allow the court to prosecute war crimes perpetrators could raise hackles among conservatives for whom the court is an unaccountable body that cannot be trusted to do the right thing. The 97 countries that have ratified the 1998 Rome Treaty establishing the court based in The Hague, Netherlands -including all European Union nations -maintain that there are sufficient safeguards built into the process to prevent unwarranted prosecutions.

France agreed to postpone a vote until Thursday after the United States said it wanted to amend the draft resolution to ensure that no Americans could be handed over to the court, the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal, U.N. diplomats said.

The United States came up with amendments late Thursday [?] but the diplomats said they weren't acceptable to the nine council members that are parties to the court, including France and close U.S. ally Britain.

In response, France drafted new amendments which were to be shared with the court's supporters overnight and discussed with the Americans on Thursday, the diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The 15 Security Council nations have been deadlocked for weeks on the issue of holding people accountable in Sudan, and the court's supporters have demanded a vote on the French resolution.

The French draft introduced last week would refer Darfur cases since July 1, 2002 to the International Criminal Court. That was the recommendation of a U.N. panel that had found crimes against humanity - but not genocide - occurred in the vast western region.

In a clear concession to the United States, the resolution said citizens of countries that have not ratified the treaty establishing the court will not be subject to prosecution by the court if they take part in activities in Sudan.

Diplomats said Washington was concerned that the language wasn't airtight and therefore proposed the amendments.

Details of the final text were not disclosed in Washington or New York.

Negotiations on the draft have been going on in key capitals, with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier, and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw trying to agree on wording that would allow the United States to abstain rather than veto the resolution, the diplomats said.

A veto could be politically damaging because it would give the appearance that the United States opposed the punishment of those responsible for atrocities in Darfur, the scene of perhaps the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

The widespread death and destruction has been the result of a brutal counterinsurgency campaign led by government-supported Arab militias against black African rebels. The conflict began in February 2003, and the number of dead is now estimated at 180,000.

Last September, former Secretary of State Colin Powell said the perpetrators had engaged in genocide. Tens of thousands of displaced Darfurians are confined to refugee camps, refusing to return to their villages for fear they would only be forced to flee once again.

On Tuesday, the Security Council passed a resolution strengthening the arms embargo in Darfur to include the Sudanese government and imposing an asset freeze and travel ban on those who defy peace efforts.

Last week, the council voted to deploy 10,000 U.N. peacekeepers to monitor a peace deal between the government and southern rebels that ended a 21-year civil war. The council hopes the resolution will also help Darfur move toward peace as well.

The United States would allow the International Criminal Court it fiercely opposes to try perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan's Darfur region if it can ensure Americans would not be prosecuted by the court, U.S. officials said on Wednesday.

It appeared unlikely that all the U.S. demands would be accepted by the at least nine nations expected to vote for a French-proposed U.N. Security Council resolution giving the ICC jurisdiction in Darfur.

The Bush administration is in the difficult position of either swallowing some of its qualms about the ICC or vetoing a resolution to prosecute people for the pillage, slaughter and rape in Darfur that Washington itself has called genocide.

No one expects the United States to vote in favor, but European envoys, who are strong supporters of the court, hope Washington will abstain and not use its veto power in exchange for some changes in the text.

"We are trying to find language that we would find acceptable. We're trying to make the resolution work so that we can avoid a train wreck," said one U.S. official.

France, backed by Britain, agreed to delay a vote on the resolution until Thursday in hopes of averting a U.S. veto.

Diplomats said France had revised its resolution to meet some U.S. concerns and council member governments were studying the text overnight. But a senior envoy said most of the council was willing to risk a U.S. veto rather than undermine the ICC.

The envoy also said concessions to the United States needed to be limited to the case of Sudan because the Security Council should not change ICC statutes ratified by 98 countries.

"We would like a deal tomorrow. ... We're going the extra mile," said a senior Bush administration official. "But if we cannot work out protection for American nationals then obviously we're not going to be able to go along with it. There is always the possibility of an American veto."

Nine of the 15 council members have ratified the treaty establishing the ICC, the world's first permanent criminal court set up to try individuals for genocide, war crimes and gross human rights abuses.

Over the last two years, at least 180,000 people have died from fighting, hunger and disease in Darfur. Rape is common and more than 2 million people, mainly African villagers, have been forced out of their homes by Arab militia.

The council can refer cases to the ICC, based in The Hague, if the country where the crimes occurred is unwilling or unable to bring perpetrators to justice. The Bush administration opposes the ICC, fearing its citizens would be targets of politically motivated prosecutions, and is not a party to it.

U.S. officials described three "protections" they want for their citizens in order to permit ICC jurisdiction in Sudan.

The first would exempt foreign forces in any peacekeeping mission for Sudan from ICC jurisdiction and would allow them to be tried only by their national authorities, something the Security Council reluctantly backed for peacekeepers in Liberia in 2003.

The second, and most controversial, would allow the United States to opt out of ICC jurisdiction over war crimes for its peacekeeping forces throughout the world for seven years.

Parties to the ICC's founding treaty have such a seven-year opt-out for war crimes and the U.S. officials argued they should have the same right without, however, conceding their forces would be subject to its jurisdiction after seven years.

But diplomats said its was highly unlikely that the nine council members who have ratified the court's treaty could take a decision that they feel belongs to all members of the court.

Third, the United States wants guarantees it would not be asked to cooperate with the ICC in ways that violate limits on such cooperation imposed by U.S. law. U.S. officials said there was little opposition to this from other nations.

The International Criminal Court was gearing up Thursday for a possible war crimes investigation in Sudan's violence-plagued Darfur region -- an important case that officials say could confirm the fledgling tribunal's legitimacy.

The U.N. Security Council is expected to vote Thursday on a resolution that would authorize the prosecution of Sudanese war crimes suspects by the court, whose creation was fiercely opposed by the United States.

The resolution appeared more likely to pass after U.S. officials said Washington was dropping its objections to sending the Sudan case to the court because the international pressure was too great, especially from the European countries.

The court was established in July 2002 to prosecute individual perpetrators of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, but it has not yet tried a case.

Some 98 countries have ratified its founding treaty, but the United States sought to undermine its powers by signing bilateral immunity deals with countries guaranteeing they would not hand over U.S. nationals to the court.

Prosecutors said in January they would welcome the Darfur case if they were given jurisdiction by the United Nations.

Once prosecutors have jurisdiction, they would begin a preliminary analysis to determine if the crimes fall under their authority. A court official who spoke on condition on anonymity said the prosecutor would be expected to report back to the U.N. Security Council in a matter of weeks about launching a formal investigation.

A case of such magnitude would place the young institution at the center of a conflict which is estimated to have cost hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced millions more. It also would put a severe strain on its 2005 budget of around euro70 million (US$91 million).

Michael Wladimiroff, an attorney who defended the first suspect at the U.N. tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the mid-1990s, called the apparent shift in U.S. policy an unexpected change that could open the way for further cases at the Netherlands-based court.

"This means the court ... can now be used as an instrument by the Security Council," Wladimiroff said. "All of a sudden there will be a change from waiting for cases to expanding capacity and moving more quickly toward trials."

If the United States were to drop its opposition to having cases referred by the United Nations, that would signal political acceptance of the court, albeit indirectly, he said.

The ICC is a court of last resort, empowered to step in only when countries are "unwilling or unable" to dispense justice themselves. It can only prosecute crimes if they have been committed in countries that ratified the Rome Treaty, if a nonmember country grants it special jurisdiction or if the United Nations refers a case.

Prosecutors have said they expected to issue the first arrest warrants and begin trials later this year against suspects in Uganda and Congo, but officials said they would need more money to open such a large-scale investigation.

Prosecutors are reviewing possible cases in six countries, among them Sudan, Ivory Coast and the Central African Republic. Darfur would pose a great challenge, not least because of the danger of sending investigators into a conflict zone to prepare cases and interview witnesses.

The western Sudanese region of Darfur has been the scene of perhaps the world's worst humanitarian crisis. The widespread death and destruction has been the result of a brutal counterinsurgency campaign led by government-support Arab militias against black African farmers. The conflict began in February 2003.

March 30, 2005

SudanDivestment.org should not, however, be confused with the Sudan Divestment Campaign (at sudandivestment.com), which was described in this recent post--even though SudanDivestment.org does use the "Sudan Divestment Campaign" name in a few places on the site. (Confused?)

In her 2001 article "Bystanders to Genocide," Pulitzer Prize winning author Samantha Power recounts how President Clinton was shocked and outraged by an article written by Philip Gourevitch recounting the horrors of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, prompting him to send the article to his national security advisor Sandy Berger with a note scrawled in the margin reading "Is what he's saying true? How did this happen?"

After taking office, President Bush reportedly read Power's article on the Clinton administration's failure to intervene during the genocide. He too scrawled a message in the margin - "NOT ON MY WATCH."

Yet we are now faced with another African genocide, this time in Darfur, and the United States and the rest of the world are responding exactly as they did during Rwanda - with paralyzed inaction.

Though there are many key differences between what is taking place in Darfur and what occurred in Rwanda a decade ago, there are also many similarities.

In 1993, the world watched "Schindler's List" and wondered how such horrors could unfold and why they were not stopped. In 2004, it watched "Hotel Rwanda" and asked the same questions. In each case, those questions went unanswered.

Just as in Rwanda, the international military force on the ground in Darfur is far too small, poorly equipped and operating under an extremely limited mandate that does not allow them to protect civilians at risk.

Just as in Rwanda, the genocide is taking place against a backdrop of "civil war," leading the international community to focus more on establishing a cease-fire than protecting those being killed.

Just as in Rwanda, the death toll is nearly impossible to determine.

Just as in Rwanda, the United Nations is more or less paralyzed as individual nations seek to protect their own national interests rather than helpless men, women and children.

Just as in Rwanda, media coverage is almost nonexistent, Congress is all but silent, and the human rights community is having difficulty get the nation to pay attention to a genocide in progress.

Just as in Rwanda, a genocide is unfolding - but this time it is happening on our watch.

We ask you to join the Coalition for Darfur as we attempt to raise awareness of the genocide in Darfur and raise money for the live saving work Save the Children is doing there.